Podcast
Is America Ready to Vote by Phone?
Archon Fung and Stephen Richer are joined by Michelle Feldman, political director at Mobile Voting, a nonprofit, nonpartisan initiative working to make voting easier with expanded access to mobile voting.
Book
The Right to Vote: The Contested History of Democracy in the United States
Issues
Most Americans take for granted their right to vote, whether they choose to exercise it or not. But the history of suffrage in the U.S. is, in fact, the story of a struggle to achieve this right by our society’s marginalized groups. In The Right to Vote, HKS historian Alexander Keyssar explores the evolution of suffrage over the course of the nation’s history. Examining the many features of the history of the right to vote in the U.S.—class, ethnicity, race, gender, religion, and age—the book explores the conditions under which American democracy has expanded and contracted over the years. Keyssar presents convincing evidence that the history of the right to vote has not been one of a steady history of expansion and increasing inclusion, noting that voting rights contracted substantially in the U.S. between 1850 and 1920. Keyssar also presents a controversial thesis: that the primary factor promoting the expansion of the suffrage has been war and the primary factors promoting contraction or delaying expansion have been class tension and class conflict. The June 2009 edition includes a new chapter on voting rights since 2000.
Basic Books, 2009
Podcast
Is Trump’s higher education compact a bad deal but a good opportunity?
This week, Danielle Allen joins Archon Fung and Stephen Richer on Terms of Engagement.
Commentary
Why I’m Excited About the White House’s Proposal for a Higher Ed Compact
Last week’s leak of the U.S. Department of Education’s proposed “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education” drew intense reactions across academia. Critics call it government overreach threatening free expression, while supporters see a chance for reform and renewed trust between universities and policymakers. Danielle Allen, James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University, director of the Democratic Knowledge Project and the Allen Lab for Democracy Renovation, weighs in.